All posts tagged Iowa Caucuses

Former U.S. Sen. Jim Webb, who is exploring a Democratic presidential bid, will be a speaker at a state party event in Iowa in April, a potential forum for him to make the case that he is a viable alternative to Hillary Clinton for the party’s nomination.

Mr. Webb will speak at a Polk County Democrats awards dinner on April 10, and will make other stops in Iowa during the trip, a spokesman for the former Virginia senator said. Read More »

Hoping to draw Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren into the 2016 presidential race, MoveOn.org will host a rally in Iowa on Wednesday aimed at demonstrating she enjoys grassroots support that would make her a viable candidate.

The event is set for 5:30 p.m. CST at a coffee shop in Des Moines, capital of the state that holds the nation’s first presidential nominating contest. Read More »

There’s a kind of Washington disease which compels its victims to move immediately from one presidential campaign into speculation about the next one.

Yes, it’s broken out again. And this blog post is just further evidence of it.

A couple of other signs this week:

Both Rep. Paul Ryan, this year’s Republican vice presidential nominee, and Sen. Marco Rubio, the man many thought was the other most likely VP choice, used a dinner of the Jack Kemp Foundation to give speeches laying out their views about government, the middle class and the disadvantaged. My colleague Neil King writes about the event here.

What’s most noteworthy about the speeches were the efforts by both men to try to start erecting that “big tent” of Republican politics that former President Ronald Reagan used to talk about, and that many in the party thought was absent in this year’s campaign. Read More »

The announcement comes after problems counting the vote in the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses. The first tally had GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney ahead by eight votes, but on Jan. 20, the Iowa Republican Party declared Mr. Santorum to be the official winner. But it was unable to confirm results from eight of the state’s 1,774 precincts, leaving questions over the outcome and the party’s procedures for recording votes.

Mr. Strawn didn’t mention that trouble in his resignation letter to Iowa Republicans, but focused on the positive: “We kept the Iowa Caucuses First-in-the-Nation. We broke fundraising records, hosted the largest Republican presidential caucus in history, and for the first-time ever, the Iowa GOP co-hosted three nationally televised presidential debates that were watched by millions. Most importantly, Iowa Republicans accomplished all this and more working together as a team.” Read More »

The Iowa Republican Party issued a statement late Friday night to affirm that Mr. Santorum is the official winner of the state’s first-in-the-nation presidential nominating contest.

“In order to clarify conflicting reports and to affirm the results released January 18 by the Republican Party of Iowa, Chairman Matthew Strawn and the State Central Committee declared Senator Rick Santorum the winner of the 2012 Iowa Caucus,” the state party said in a release that went out just before midnight on the East Coast, or nearly two full days after the updated results were made public. Read More »

Revised vote totals out of Iowa give Rick Santorum a slight edge over Mitt Romney in the country’s first-in-the-nation caucuses, the Iowa Republican Party announced this morning. But party officials said the tally remains too cloudy to declare a clear winner because the final count in eight precincts will never be certified.

The state GOP declared a split decision in the country’s first nominating contest as a result of this confusion. Mr. Romney was initially declared the tentative winner — by eight votes — when the caucuses were held earlier this month, making him the first nonincumbent Republican to win both Iowa and New Hampshire, so this latest news represents a reversal of fortune for the front-runner. Messrs. Romney and Santorum both lost votes when Republican Party officials went through the process of certifying the results.

The final tally gave Mr. Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, 29,839 votes, 34 more than Mr. Romney. Texas Rep. Ron Paul got 26,036 votes, while 16,163 went to Newt Gingrich and 12,557 to Texas Gov. Rick Perry. This latest turn is another black eye for Iowa and its first-in-the-nation caucus process, which has been under fire for years from party officials in other states who resent its coveted slot in the nominating calendar… Read More »

The totals reported just after the Jan. 3 caucuses gave Mr. Romney a narrow, 8-vote win over former Sen. Rick Santorum. Now, officials are reviewing the vote as part of a certification process. Whether Mr. Romney will hold onto his win remains unclear, these people said.

“The numbers are changing,’’ Mr. Santorum said late Friday, in an interview at a campaign event here.

“We’re hearing good things,’’ he said. “It’s still up in the air.’’ Read More »

After a long Tuesday night, the results from the Iowa caucuses are in: Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum finished a mere eight votes apart. Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who finished fifth, announced he’ll “return to Texas, assess the results of the caucus.” And this morning, Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann has decided to end her campaign.

This is a battle for delegates — a long one. It’s not a winner take all election to serve as Iowa governor, senator, or whatever. Thus, it’s fair to conclude that both Romney and Santorum won; Bachmann, Gingrich, and Perry lost; and Paul remains a libertarian insurgent who cannot win the GOP nomination because he is too far out of step with the modern GOP.

In 2012, Romney won an effective tie for first place. The conservative, “anti-Romney” vote was spread across four other candidates; Rick Santorum won the most, but still not enough for a clear victory. What’s more, Santorum’s win was due in large part to being the only “unvetted” conservative in the race. He has baggage of his own, little funding, almost no institutional support, and (unlike Huckabee) cannot count on the South embracing him as a native son… Read More »

There will be a lot to watch in the results out of Iowa tonight – from former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s standing with evangelical Christian voters to the power of the former Pennsylvania’s Sen. Rick Santorum’s “surge” – but savvy political watchers might want to keep an eye peeled on the results out of Sioux County in the state’s northwest corner.

Sioux isn’t known for picking winners. The social conservatism there means voters usually pick the candidate with the strongest cultural conservative bona fides – Pat Buchanan in 1996, Gary Bauer in 2000 and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in 2008.

But the second-place finisher in that county of 6,000 has gone on to win the GOP nomination in each of those election years. The strong social conservatism with the rank-and-file sits atop an organized establishment that tends to back the candidate seen as being most able to win.

Handicapping a caucus is a fool’s errand, but early unofficial polls done by the local newspaper back in November picked up the on the “Santorum surge” before anyone else. He is reportedly still running well with conservatives there.

And the all-important second-place finisher? Even now it’s too early to hazard a guess.

Starting after 7 p.m. CST you’ll be able to track the county-by-county results out of Iowa on this map at WNYC.org or here, at Patchwork Nation. The map uses Patchwork Nation’s demographic/geographic breakdown to assess who is winning in different types of counties in Iowa – from wealthier, suburban Monied Burbs to rural agricultural Tractor Country counties. Sioux County, on the upper left of the map, is a Tractor Country locale. Read More »

The caucuses begin promptly at 7 p.m. CST and Washington Wire will be live-blogging until the votes are in.

9:37 am (EST)

Sara Murray

Mitt Romney kicks off his last campaign event (aside from his caucus night party) in Des Moines with an entourage. In the ranks: Four of his five sons, his wife, Ann Romney, Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R., Utah), Rep. Jeff Flake (R., Ariz.) and former Missouri Sen. Jim Talent.

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